Oil and gas industry news: 16 October 2014

American Midstream

American Midstream Partners, LP, has announced the acquisition of Costar Midstream LLC from Energy Spectrum Partners VI LP and Costar management for approximately US$ 470 million. Costar is an onshore gathering and processing company with its primary gathering, processing, fractionation and off spec condensate treating and stabilisation assets in east Texas and the Permian basin, with a significant crude oil gathering system project underway in the Bakken oil play.

The acquisition was funded with 6.9 million American Midstream common units issued directly to Energy Spectrum and Costar senior management, which are subject to customary lockup provisions, and US$ 272 million of cash from borrowings under the Partnership’s revolving credit facility and proceeds from the August 2014 private placement of common units. The acquisition closed on October 14.

DOE

Bioenergy, the use of agricultural waste and forestry byproducts to generate heat and energy, will be celebrated during the second annual National Bioenergy Day on October 22. This is an opportunity to showcase bioenergy facilities and the bioenergy supply chain around the US. The Bioenergy Technologies Office (BETO) will celebrate National Bioenergy Day with an educational display about the bioenergy supply chain and the bioeconomy in the lobby of the Energy Department’s Forrestal building in downtown Washington D.C.

HIMA

HIMA has announced a three year agreement with Borealis to provide safety instrumented systems, components and related services to Borealis sites around the world. HIMA, Borealis’ main vendor for emergency shutdown (ESD) systems, will continue to provide safety systems that further strengthen Borealis’ ongoing safety focus by applying leading edge safety technology and services. HIMA systems will allow Borealis to implement the highest level of safety integrity and have the flexibility to update, maintain or modify the systems without interrupting their protective functions or production operations.

Intergraph

ARC Advisory Group has ranked Intergraph as the Number 1 overall engineering design solution provider for plant design based on revenues. This marks the eighth consecutive year Intergraph has been named the global leader in ARC’s global market research study ‘Engineering Design Tools for Plants and Infrastructure Worldwide Outlook,’ which was first released in 2006.

The study finds Intergraph has a clear lead over its competitors in terms of overall global market share. Within the plant design category, Intergraph also leads the rankings in primary industries including: chemical, oil and gas, and mining and metals.

OMV

The Supervisory Board of OMV Aktiengesellschaft and Gerhard Roiss have agreed that Gerhard Roiss resigned from his position as Chairman of the Executive Board and CEO as of June 30 next year. The Supervisory Board has initiated the process to identify suitable candidates for the success as CEO of OMV.

Furthermore, the Supervisory Board took the decision to integrate the business segment Gas and Power into the business segment Refining and Marketing, thereby creating a combined business segment Downstream headed by Executive Board member Manfred Leitner as of January 1 next year. Negotiations with Hans-Peter Floren, Executive Board member for Gas and Power, on his contract will begin.